Technique G199:Providing success feedback when data is submitted successfully

Applicability

Content that accepts user data input.

This technique relates to:

• 3.3.1: Error Identification (Advisory)
• 3.3.3: Error Suggestion (Advisory)
• 3.3.4: Error Prevention (Legal, Financial, Data) (Advisory)
• 4.1.3: Status Messages (Sufficient when used with ARIA22: Using role=status to present status messages)

Description

The objective of this technique is to reduce the effort required for users to confirm that an action, such as submitting a Web form, was completed successfully. This can be accomplished by providing consistently presented feedback that explicitly indicates success of an action, rather than requiring a user to navigate through content to discover if the action was successful.

Significant effort can be expended by users who can not easily scan through information to confirm their action (such as that data submitted has been successfully entered into a database, sent to a person, or added to content being edited).

Examples

• A user logs into a system and gets a response indicating that: "You have successfully logged in," so they do not need to navigate through the screen to find an indicator that they are logged in, such as finding their user name, or perhaps the login link replaced with a logout link. Finding these cues can be time consuming.
• A user fills in a quiz or test and submits it. The response informs them that the test was successfully submitted, so that they don't need to navigate through data, such as a list of submitted tests, to confirm that the test is listed there.
• A visitor creates an account on a Web site. After submission of the form, feedback suggests that "Registration was successfully submitted ...," If they are automatically logged in after registration, the response also says "...and you have been logged in." If confirmation is required, the feedback includes a message such as "...an email has been sent to you to which you must reply to confirm your registration."
• A user submits a form with information directed at support staff. The feedback indicates that the "The message was successfully sent, and you should receive a reply within the next 48 hours."

Tests